Comic

No other British comic has impacted on the international imaginary as 2000AD has. Originally conceived as a weekly anthology of science-fictional stories, it aimed to turn the influence of 1970s American science fiction films on the British imagination into a readership base. First published in 1977 by IPC (International Publishing Corporation), and acquired by [...]

The very first adventure of Adèle Blanc-Sec throws the protagonist into an incredibly convoluted plot that involves spiritism, remote viewing, a resurrected pterodactyl, a flying machine resembling that creature, the entire Paris police force, a mysterious theft, mistaken identities and forlorn lovers. If one can describe the entire series as a mix of the [...]

The Adventures of Tintin started as a modest weekly installment in “Le Petit Vingtième,” the youth pages of a small Catholic Belgian newspaper, “Le Vingtième Siècle” (The 20th Century). Its creator, Hergé (1907-1983), was totally taken by surprise by the success of this character, whose adventures were soon published in other Catholic magazines abroad [...]

Astro Boy is a classic shōnen manga authored by Osamu Tezuka (1928-1989), serialized in comics magazine Shōnenin 1952-1968. Its huge success led to an anime adaption in the 1960s, followed by TV series, movies and video game adaptations. It also spanned remakes such as The Original Astro Boy by Ken Steacy et al., which [...]

Banya: the Explosive Delivery Man is a Korean comic, also known as a manhwa that is written and illustrated by Kim Young-oh (1979-present). It currently is one of the top ten selling titles in all of Korea. Dark Horse Comics, an American comic book and manga publisher, issued the first volume of the series [...]

Barefoot Gen is a semi-autobiographical manga series penned by Keiji Nakazawa (1939-2012), about a young survivor of the atomic bombing in Hiroshima, partly based on Nakazawa’s own experiences in the bombing. Gen Nakaoka lives in Hiroshima together with his family. When his father openly protests against the militaristic regime and war, the whole family [...]

The Beano first appeared (as The Beano Comic) in July 1938 as a companion to Dundee-based publisher D.C. Thompson’s pioneering The Dandy Comic, which had debuted six months earlier. Along with The Magic Comic, which would follow a year later, these new weekly comic papers represented Thompson’s highly successful campaign to extend its success [...]

Suske en Wiske, created by Willy Vandersteen, is unquestionably the most famous comics series in Flemish Belgium. Published since 1945, counting more than three hundred stories, Suske en Wiske – known in French as Bob et Bobette and in English as Spike and Suzy – is a classical family adventure. The prototypical characters – [...]

Created in 1976 for Marvel UK, Captain Britain (an identity most famously held by Brian Braddock) has become a fixture in the United Kingdom of the main Marvel Universe. Originally an equivalent of Captain America, Captain Britain (a label at various times worn by Braddock, his sister Elizabeth, and teacher Kelsey Leigh Kirkland) has [...]

Charley’s War was a British comic created by Pat Mills (writer) and Joe Colquhoun (artist) that ran from 1979 until 1985 and followed the life of an underage soldier fighting for the British army during the First World War. For the majority of its run, Charley’s War was an examination of life in the [...]